'Don’t share or tell anyone I did this': Politico reporter criticized for email to Clinton campaign chair
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Glenn Thrush, a top Politico reporter, found himself in hot water for an email he sent in 2015 to Hillary Clinton campaign chairman John Podesta.
Thrush, who was working on a story in April 2015 about "Hillary's big-money dilemma," asked Podesta if he could look over a couple of paragraphs that pertained to him.
"Because I have become a hack i will send u the whole section that pertains to u," Thrush wrote.
The Politico reporter added: "Please don't share or tell anyone I did this. Tell me if I f----- anything up."
The exchange was revealed in the latest WikiLeaks dumping of hacked emails from Podesta's account.
Sending paragraphs from a story to ensure accuracy is not uncommon in journalism, and there is no proof that Podesta asked to have anything changed. Later in the email thread, he said "no problems here."
Nevertheless, Thrush found himself under fire online.
Charles Cooke, editor of the National Review Online, a conservative publication, wrote in a tweet that "of course this is who you are, @GlennThrush."
Dan Froomkin, Washington editor at The Intercept, a left-leaning publication, was similarly condemning of the leaked email.
"Prediction: @politico will not fire @GlennThrush because then they’d have to fire MOST OF THEIR STAFF," he wrote on Twitter."
Asked if the ordeal violated editorial standards, Brad Dayspring, Politico's vice president of communications, said in a statement to Business Insider that Thrush's job is not to "appear perfect when someone illegally hacks email."
"Glenn is one of the top political reporters in the country, in no small part because he understands that it is his job is to get inside information, not appear perfect when someone illegally hacks email," Dayspring said. "Cutting through the clutter, what is clear in this case is that Glenn got the chairman of the notoriously secretive Clinton campaign – who is not typically a font of detail – to confirm a bunch of inside information that he culled from other sources."
"I can speak with firsthand knowledge and experience that Glenn checks the validity of often complex reporting with everybody, on both sides of the aisle," he added.
The Clinton campaign has said Russia is behind the WikiLeaks hacks, attempting to swing the election in favor of Donald Trump.